A Forrester Total Economic Project Director:

Impact™ Study Jonathan Lipsitz

Commissioned By
Microsoft Project Contributor
Adrienne Capaldo

March 2015

The Total Economic

Impact™ Of Microsoft
Internet Explorer 11
Streamlined Upgrade And Cost
Savings Position Companies For The
Future
Table Of Contents
Executive Summary ............................................................................. 3
Disclosures .......................................................................................... 4
TEI Framework And Methodology........................................................ 6
The Current State Of Internet Explorer 11 In The Marketplace ............ 7
Analysis .............................................................................................. 10
Financial Summary............................................................................. 22
Microsoft Internet Explorer 11: Overview .......................................... 23
Appendix A: Composite Organization Description ............................ 24
Appendix B: Total Economic Impact™ Overview .............................. 25
Appendix C: Forrester And The Age Of The Customer ..................... 26
Appendix D: Glossary ........................................................................ 27
Appendix E: Endnotes ....................................................................... 27

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 3

Executive Summary
Microsoft commissioned Forrester Consulting to conduct a Total Economic Impact™ (TEI) study and examine the potential
return on investment (ROI) enterprises may realize by upgrading from Internet Explorer 8 (IE8) to Internet Explorer 11 (IE11).
The purpose of this study is to provide readers with a framework to evaluate the potential financial impact of IE11 on their
organizations to reduce IT costs, improve user productivity, and work more closely with customers and partners.
To better understand the benefits, costs, and risks associated with an IE11 implementation, Forrester interviewed several
customers that have upgraded to IE11 and also conducted a broader industry survey in order to better understand the
current market impact, attitudes, and behaviors with regards to the implementation of IE11.
Prior to upgrading to IE11, customers were typically on IE8 and also using other browsers. This resulted in higher technology
costs as well as reduced productivity for business users and application developers. With IE11, the interviewed companies
can now run all of their web apps, as well as those from third-party vendors, in a single environment. This has reduced
technology upgrade, application development, and application testing costs. It has also reduced the level of effort required to
support the browser environment. One company said: “IE11 Enterprise Mode enables us to move faster than before. There
are a lot of our software providers out there that cannot keep up with our pace. Enterprise Mode meant we could move
forward without worrying about them.”

INTERNET EXPLORER 11 REDUCES TECHNOLOGY COSTS AND INCREASES BUSINESS AGILITY

Our interviews with four existing customers, an online survey of 150 customers, and subsequent financial analysis found that
a composite organization (multinational financial services company with 125,000 employees) based on these interviewed
organizations experienced the risk-adjusted ROI benefits and costs shown in Figure 1.1 See Appendix A for a description of
the composite organization.
The composite organization analysis points to benefits of $9.9 million versus costs of $1.4 million, resulting in a net present
value (NPV) of $7 million.

FIGURE 1
Financial Summary Showing Three-Year Risk-Adjusted Results

ROI: NPV: Shorter Fewer

512% $7 million deployment applications
time: to redevelop:
53 months of 51 months of
effort saved effort saved

Source: Forrester Research, Inc.

 4

› Benefits. The composite organization experienced the following risk-adjusted benefits that represent those experienced by
the interviewed companies and that could be quantified for this study:
• Upgrading from IE8 to IE11 was 1.8 times faster than expected because of Enterprise Mode. Based on a
previous upgrade to IE8, the composite organization would have expected the deployment to take 119 months of
effort for testing, planning, implementation, rollout, etc. Because of Enterprise Mode and other capabilities within
IE11, the deployment took only 66 months of effort. This resulted in a cost savings of $498,200 and meant that the
business-related benefits of IE11 could be realized that much faster.
• The effort to rewrite applications to modern browser standards was reduced by 75%. The composite
organization had many web apps that did not meet modern browser standards. By the composite organization
running these applications in Enterprise Mode, they did not need to be rewritten. They could be replaced over time
as part of their natural refresh/replacement cycle instead of the composite organization undertaking additional work.
Fifty-one months of application development effort were saved, which equates to $507,600.
• Ongoing browser support costs and critical application testing were significantly reduced. The number of
employees required to support multiple browser environments and test browser upgrades was reduced from 3.5 full-
time equivalent (FTE) employees to 1.5. Additionally, 800 days of effort that would have been required for quarterly
testing of mission-critical applications have been removed. Together, $586,560 in annual IT support costs have been
eliminated.
• Many business users have seen improved productivity by not having to navigate multiple browsers. Five
percent of the composite organization’s employees had grown accustomed to working in multiple browsers. This
resulted in wasted time remembering in which system to do what activity, and then navigating around. By saving 6
minutes per day, the productivity gain — after being discounted by 50% — was $2,738,906 per year, which is
equivalent to reducing headcount by 31 FTEs.

› Costs. The composite organization experienced the following risk-adjusted costs:

• IE11 implementation effort of $712,800. Sixty-six months of effort were spent across three phases – initial
technology testing, application testing, and global rollout. All of this effort was internal, and there was practically no
need for professional services.
• Web application redevelopment costs of $194,400. Out of the 450 applications the composite organization had, it
decided to redevelop 50 of the applications because of new business requirements, even though the apps would
have worked as is in Enterprise Mode. Another 150 applications were not redeveloped, and this associated benefit
was discussed above. Each application, on average, required 60 hours of effort, for a total savings of 3,000 work
hours.
• Ongoing browser support of $185,400 per year. After the upgrade to IE11, 1.5 FTEs work to support browser
deployments, upgrades, and testing. This is significantly less than previously, when multiple browser environments
were supported, and this associated benefit is covered in the Benefits section of the study.

Disclosures
The reader should be aware of the following:

› The study is commissioned by Microsoft and delivered by Forrester Consulting. It is not meant to be used as a competitive
analysis.

› Forrester makes no assumptions as to the potential ROI that other organizations will receive. Forrester strongly advises
that readers use their own estimates within the framework provided in the report to determine the appropriateness of an
investment in Microsoft IE11.
 5

› Microsoft reviewed and provided feedback to Forrester, but Forrester maintains editorial control over the study and its
findings and does not accept changes to the study that contradict Forrester's findings or obscure the meaning of the study.

› Microsoft provided the customer names for the interviews but did not participate in the interviews or have any input into
which companies participated in the survey.
 6

TEI Framework And Methodology

INTRODUCTION
From the information provided in the interviews, Forrester has constructed a Total Economic Impact (TEI) framework for
those organizations considering upgrading to Microsoft Internet Explorer 11. The objective of the framework is to identify the
cost, benefit, flexibility, and risk factors that affect the investment decision, to help organizations understand how to take
advantage of specific benefits, reduce costs, and improve the overall business goals of winning, serving, and retaining
customers.

APPROACH AND METHODOLOGY

Forrester took a multistep approach to evaluate the impact that Microsoft IE11 can have on an organization (see Figure 2).
Specifically, we:

› Interviewed Microsoft marketing, sales, and engineering personnel, along with Forrester analysts, to gather data relative to
IE11 and the marketplace for web browsers.

› Interviewed four organizations currently using Microsoft IE11 to obtain data with respect to costs, benefits, and risks.

› Conducted an online survey of 150 organizations in the US, UK, Germany, and Japan that have implemented IE11. The
study was conducted in January 2015.

› Designed a composite organization based on characteristics of the interviewed organizations (see Appendix A).

› Constructed a financial model representative of the interviews using the TEI methodology. The financial model is
populated with the cost and benefit data obtained from the interviews as applied to the composite organization.

› Risk-adjusted the financial model based on issues and concerns the interviewed organizations highlighted in interviews.
Risk adjustment is a key part of the TEI methodology. While interviewed organizations provided cost and benefit
estimates, some categories included a broad range of responses or had a number of outside forces that might have
affected the results. For that reason, some cost and benefit totals have been risk-adjusted and are detailed in each
relevant section.
Forrester employed four fundamental elements of TEI in modeling the Microsoft IE11 solution: benefits, costs, flexibility, and
risks.
Given the increasing sophistication that enterprises have regarding ROI analyses related to IT investments, Forrester’s TEI
methodology serves to provide a complete picture of the total economic impact of purchase decisions. Please see Appendix
B for additional information on the TEI methodology.

FIGURE 2
TEI Approach

Construct
Conduct Design
Perform financial Write
customer composite
due diligence model using case study
interviews organization
TEI framework

Source: Forrester Research, Inc.

 7

The Current State Of Internet Explorer 11 In The Marketplace

In order to better understand the current market impact, attitudes, and behaviors with regards to the implementation of
Internet Explorer 11, Forrester conducted an online survey of 150 organizations in the US, UK, Germany, and Japan that
have implemented IE11. Survey participants included IT professionals who are involved in the decisions related to web
browsers from firms with 1,000 or more employees. The online survey focused on organizations’ behavior and their attitudes
about the adoption of Internet Explorer 11, understanding the effort involved in the upgrade to Internet Explorer 11, and what
benefits these organizations gained from their adoption of Internet Explorer 11.
From the survey, we discovered:

› The majority of organizations surveyed have at least half their organization on IE11 and plan to increase the
number of users. On average, 77% of an organization’s employee base has already been upgraded to IE11. In addition,
66% of organizations plan to increase the number of users on IE11 over the next year. IT professionals have the desire to
bring the benefits of IE11 to the rest of their organization.

› Organizations upgraded to Internet Explorer 11 for improved security, modern web standards, and increased
performance. Forrester’s survey found that 61% of organizations upgraded to IE11 due to its improved security features.
Fifty-five percent of these organizations adopted IE11 because it provided better compatibility with modern web standards.
This compatibility feature is significantly more important for responding organizations in Europe than our other countries.
For 48% of organizations, the increased performance of the browser was a key reason for the upgrade. These key
features are important for both IT and business users. Figure 2 highlights these reasons.

FIGURE 2
Reasons For Upgrade To IE11

“What were the main reasons for your upgrade to Internet Explorer (IE) 11?”
(Select all that apply)

Improved security 61%

Better compatibility with modern web standards 55%

Better browser performance 48%

Continued support 31%

Better compatibility with legacy web apps 30%
Part of upgrade to Windows 8.1 25%
Desire to get away from multiple browsers 13%
Other, please specify 1%

Base: 150 organizations that have Microsoft IE11 deployed

Source: Forrester Research, Inc.

› Organizations reported a number of benefits from investment in IE11, with improved IT security and reduced IT
support costs at the top of the list. Forty-three percent of organizations reported improved IT security as a benefit of
their upgrade to IE11; this benefit was even greater for organizations with 20,000 or more employees. Forty percent of
organizations reported a reduction in IT support costs, commonly due to the fact that their IT organization needed to
support fewer browsers. Additionally, over a third of organizations reported improved user productivity, thanks to the
 8

improved web app performance. Figure 3 highlights these and other benefits the organizations received from upgrading
their company to IE11.

FIGURE 3
Top Benefits From IE11 Investment

“Which of the following benefit areas has your organization received/ do you expect your
organization to receive from your investment in Microsoft Internet Explorer 11?”
(Select all that apply)

Improved IT security 43%

Reduction in IT support costs due to fewer browsers supported 40%

Improved user productivity due to improved web app performance 37%

Improved external website performance 32%

Increased website reliability/lower failure rates 29%

Reduced web app dev and testing costs due to greater 26%
interoperability across devices and browsers
Reduced web app dev and testing costs due to greater 25%
compatibility with older browser versions

Base: 150 organizations that have Microsoft IE11 deployed

Source: Forrester Research, Inc.

› Backward compatibility features made for an easier-than-expected implementation and greater benefits. When
asked how the implementation of IE11 matched their expectations, 47% of organizations said they found the
implementation easier than expected. Of those respondents, 90% of organizations said the ease of migration was due to
IE11’s backward compatibility features, such as Enterprise Mode. The respondents who used these features were more
likely to report a reduction in IT support costs and improved user productivity than other organizations.
 9

FIGURE 4
Enterprise Mode Makes Upgrading Easier

“How did the implementation of IE11 match “In your view, what factors made the
your expectations prior to going implementation easier than expected?”
into the implementation?” (Select all that apply)

Harder than expected Other factors

6% 10%

Easier than expected

47%
Roughly what we
expected
47%

Backward compatibility
features
90%

Base: 150 organizations that have Microsoft IE11 deployed

Source: Forrester Research, Inc.

› Out of 150 respondents, only nine said that the implementation was harder than expected. When asked what
factors led to the difficult implementation, survey respondents told us they did not have enough time or resources working
on the upgrade, or that they did not leverage backward compatibility. For these nine respondents, this often led to a
smaller implementation than average, with 50% or less of their organizations upgrading to IE11. In order to avoid these
pitfalls, organizations should make the case that assigning an adequate number of resources to the team and leveraging
the included backward compatibility features will ensure that their organization can take full advantage of the benefits
received from IE11.
 10

Analysis

COMPOSITE ORGANIZATION
For this study, Forrester conducted a total of four interviews with representatives from the following companies, which are
Microsoft customers based in the US and Europe:

› Global professional services organization. “Moving to IE11 is a much

› Major automobile manufacturer distribution division. easier and smoother
› Insurance company. experience. With Enterprise
› Energy exploration and production company. Mode, it is like working with a
Based on the interviews, Forrester constructed a TEI framework, a safety net. It is such a relief.
composite company, and an associated ROI analysis that illustrates
the areas financially affected. The composite organization that
You know you can enable
Forrester synthesized from these results represents an organization URLs even if it wouldn’t work
with the following characteristics:
natively in the browser.”
› US-based financial services company with operations across
North America, Europe, and Asia. ~ IT operations manager

› 125,000 employees.

› Upgrading from IE8 to IE11.

INTERVIEW HIGHLIGHTS
The composite organization, much like the interviewed and surveyed companies, was long overdue to upgrade its primary
web browser to one that supported modern browser standards and better positioned the organization for deploying future
technologies. Additionally, starting January 12, 2016, only the most recent version of Internet Explorer will be supported; on
Windows 7, only Internet Explorer 11 will continue receiving security updates and technical support. In this light, the IE11
migration was viewed as a “must-do” activity as opposed to a “nice-to-have” upgrade.
The migration was delayed because of legacy internal and external web applications that were written for older browsers.
Some of these dated back to IE5. External applications were an especially large headache, since some vendors were not
ready to upgrade their applications when the composite organization needed them to. Also, the composite organization had
customers whose legacy web applications needed to work in the internal portal environment. By using Enterprise Mode for
Internet Explorer, the composite organization eliminated these challenges. Forrester heard from one interviewee that they
were “constantly facing challenges when asked to use client portals
and data collaboration tools written for the latest browsers. It forced
[them] to create pocket solutions and have multiple browser estates to “IE11 being part of the baseline
support external customers.” makes the Windows 8.1
Additionally, the composite organization wanted to better adhere to an
N-1 technology strategy. “We are on a mission to stay current with
upgrade very attractive.”
technology,” said another interviewee. “We want to make sure that ~ Infrastructure manager
our user community has the latest and greatest tools.” Being on IE11
meant they were on the latest browser technology and could run the latest internal and external web applications. Even more
 11

importantly, moving to IE11 was seen as the first step in an upgrade to a newer Windows operating system, either Windows
8.1 or Windows 10. An IT manager said: “IE11 is tied into the OS. It is crucial for moving to Windows 10. A lot of the donkey
work we are doing now will smooth the way to Windows 10.”
One of the interviewed companies shared its internal rationale for moving to Internet Explorer 11. The main reasons
included: “[IE11] aligns with our mobile-first design and
development direction, provides agility to keep pace with faster
browser production/platform upgrades, and allows the flexibility to “A better experience for our users
leverage newer vendor products that require the latest browser improves [our IT organization’s]
versions.” All of this will “enable platform flexibility, allowing users
to access web applications through a variety of platforms [laptops, reputation and makes us appear
tablets, phones].”
cutting-edge.”
Some of the specific features within IE11 that were called out as
being the most helpful included: ~ IT director

› Enterprise Mode.

› Compatibility View.

› HTML5 support.

› Better international support (localization).

› Developer tools.
The survey results discussed earlier in the study present a wide range of benefits that organizations can experience by
upgrading to IE11. The financial analysis focuses on a subset of those benefits, and these were described in the Executive
Summary. The interviewed companies experienced other benefits that are also worth mentioning and include:

› External company image is improved for customers and partners. Being on a modern browser and providing good
user experience is very important in today’s competitive landscape. “IE11 makes us look professional,” said one
interviewee. “It helps us to win and retain business. A well-run desktop reflects a well-run company.”

› Web application and web page performance are improved.

Improved performance makes for a better user experience. It can “Clients feel more secure about
also increase user productivity by reducing the time to render,
deliver query results, etc. One interviewee said, “With improved
us and have a better
performance, people can be more efficient — do everything in less impression if there is a single,
time. Web application benchmarking is now about 10% faster with
IE11.” Another interviewee said that stability was improved and consistent platform.”
that “the browser is less sensitive to what is happening in the ~ IT administrator
application.”

› IT security is improved. No longer having to patch and support multiple browsers means that vulnerabilities are fixed
faster. IE11 is more secure “out-of-the-box” than previous versions of IE. “Security will be better even though we no longer
keep things so locked down,” said one IT executive.

› Rationalizing the IT estate increases staffing flexibility. There no longer needs to be parallel support desks to handle
different technologies. Additionally, having fewer web application performance issues will reduce help desk calls and allow
those help desk resources to work in multiple areas. “Having a unified browser will make it easy to train and bring in new
support people. Additionally, we expect to get fewer help desk calls on an ongoing basis,” one interviewee said.
 12

BENEFITS
The composite organization experienced a number of quantified benefits in this case study:

› Reduced implementation effort.

› Reduced application development effort

› Reduced ongoing support and application development testing.

› Increased business user productivity.

Reduced Implementation Effort

The time it took the composite organization to migrate to IE11 was significantly less than the time that was
required for previous Internet Explorer upgrades. This is consistent with what the interviewed companies
reported. The main reason cited was that Enterprise Mode greatly reduced, and in some cases eliminated, the
need for extensive testing of web applications before and during the migration. The actual global rollout of IE11 to
the 125,000 employees was also faster due to greater automation. Some time savings examples provided by the
interviewed companies include:

› “Our plan for IE10 had three months of system testing, and a variety of application teams doing parallel testing.
For IE11, it was reduced to one month. Some of the savings is money we would have paid to an outside
vendor.”

› “We could move very quickly to IE11 compared with the jump to IE8 and the jump to IE10.”

› “For our UK operations, we spent one week going through GPO settings and one week building out the
environment. It only required one resource. In the past it would have taken two FTEs two months. This really
adds up since we have 40 locations around the world.”

› “For the IE11 deployment, we needed 2.5 FTEs for five months. With IE8, it was four FTEs.”

› “What was reduced because of Enterprise Mode was application testing for going to IE11. The upgrade to IE8
was a huge deal, and it would have been for IE10 as well.”
For this benefit, Forrester looked at what the testing and deployment effort would have looked like for previous
versions of IE versus what it took to complete for IE11. The deployment was broken into three phases, which are
described in more detail in the Costs section of the study. Without IE11 and Enterprise Mode, we estimate that
the full deployment — including application and system testing, configuration/setup, and rollout to 125,000 users
— would have taken 17 months and seven FTEs for a total of 119 months of effort. The actual deployment of
IE11 only took 66 months of effort with an elapsed time of 12 months, which represents a 45% reduction in effort.
Interviewed organizations provided a range of time and effort to deploy IE11 and the estimated time to deploy
without Enterprise Mode. Forrester normalized these data points to adjust for different organization sizes. To
further compensate, this benefit was risk-adjusted and reduced by 6%. The risk-adjusted total benefit was
$498,200. See the section on Risks for more detail.
 13

TABLE 1
Implementation Effort Was Reduced By 45%

Ref. Metric Calculation Initial Year 1 Year 2 Year 3

A1 Estimated months effort without Enterprise Mode 17

A2 Estimated FTEs without Enterprise Mode 7

A3 Estimated total # of months of effort A1*A2 119

$120,000/12
A4 Monthly fully burdened cost $10,000
months
Estimated implementation costs without
A5 A3*A4 $1,190,000
Enterprise Mode

A6 # of months of effort for actual implementation =E7 66

A7 Actual implementation labor costs A4*A6 $660,000

At Reduced implementation effort A5-A7 $530,000

Risk adjustment  6%

Atr Reduced implementation effort (risk-adjusted) $498,200

Source: Forrester Research, Inc.

Reduced Application Development Effort

Perhaps the biggest benefit described by companies was that all of the existing web applications that are not
compatible with IE11 and other modern browsers did not have to be rewritten. These include applications written
by third parties over which the composite organization has little control. Some of them may have never been
updated, which would make moving to a modern browser extremely complex and expensive. We heard from
companies that:

› “If we were to recode rather than use applications in Enterprise Mode, we would spend millions of pounds in
recoding. Some of the applications were out of support by our vendors, so to get them working we would need
to buy special support contracts. To be honest, Enterprise Mode is a godsend.”

› “Some of our applications would have needed a lot of effort to make them work. I think it would have cost tens
of millions [of dollars] to bring all the apps up to date.”

› “All the business applications would need to be upgraded. It would cost millions [of dollars]. Otherwise, users
would have to stay on their old browsers.”

› “We will save on our third-party web development contracts with large consulting companies.”
The composite organization has 450 web applications that potentially could be affected by the browser upgrade.
Of those, 200 would have needed to be redeveloped without Enterprise Mode. Instead, this work could be put off
until they were due for natural, life-cycle redevelopment efforts in the future as business requirements changed.
Additionally, some would never need to be upgraded since they would be retired at some point.
The composite organization decided to upgrade 50 of these applications because business requirements had
changed since the last development effort. The current version of the applications would have worked fine in
 14

IE11 with Enterprise Mode. This effort is described in the Costs section of the study, and the net benefit is
eliminated development effort for 150 web applications at an average development time of 60 hours per
application.
Forrester risk-adjusted this benefit by 6% to account for the range of values we heard as to the total number of
existing web applications and the proportion of them that would need to be redeveloped. The risk-adjusted total
benefit was $507,600.

TABLE 2
Application Redevelopment Effort Was Reduced By 75%

Ref. Metric Calculation Initial Year 1 Year 2 Year 3

B1 # of apps that would need redevelopment 200

B2 Average # of hours effort 60

B3 Anticipated app development time (hours) B1*B2 12,000

$120,000/2,000
B4 Cost per hour $60
hours

B5 Total anticipated application development costs B3*B4 $720,000

B6 Actual application development hours =F3 3,000

B7 Actual application development costs B4*B6 $180,000

Bt Reduced application development effort B5-B7 $540,000

Risk adjustment  6%
Reduced application development effort (risk-
Btr $507,600
adjusted)
Source: Forrester Research, Inc.

Reduced Ongoing Support And Application Testing

In addition to upfront IT effort savings, there are also ongoing savings. Companies spoke of several areas, two of
which are included in the ROI analysis — ongoing support and ongoing application testing. For ongoing support,
consolidating onto one browser reduces the amount of IT effort needed for system testing, applying cumulative
security updates, compatibility remediation, user support, etc. Interviewees reported:

› “Operational support is much easier with only one browser. We used to run two group policy objects and
multiple versions of software updaters to make sure patches were in place. This should save four work days
per month in each of our 40 locations.”

› “We were getting at least 5,000 calls per year worldwide to remediate application compatibility issues.”

› “Some of our IT staff is getting redeployed from support to newer, higher value activities.”

› “We did some analysis and we did see a reduction in help desk call volume from people who were having
application problems. Especially from those using external web apps to do their work.”
 15

For the composite organization, the number of FTEs required to complete these activities is reduced from 3.5 to
1.5. This benefit is realized in all three years of the study.
The composite organization also saw reduced ongoing testing of mission-critical applications. Interviewed
companies undertook quarterly testing of their mission-critical applications, which required manual effort. Some
examples include:

› “We now have to do less ongoing testing. A global test takes four to six weeks, and with multiple browsers it
would take twice as long.”

› “We save 15 workdays per test and have to test 30 applications on a quarterly basis.”

› “Some of the hours built into our application maintenance and support contracts can now be used for activities
other than ongoing testing.”
For the composite organization, there are 20 web applications that are tested on a quarterly basis. By only having
to test for one browser, each test is reduced by 10 days of effort. In total, 800 workdays (3.2 FTEs) are saved in
each year of the study.
Forrester risk-adjusted this benefit by 6% because the amount of effort reduction varies based on the size of the
overall organization, including the number of users and number of web applications that need to be tested on an
ongoing basis. The risk-adjusted total benefit was $1,759,680 over three years.

TABLE 3
Ongoing Labor Savings For IT Support And Application Testing Is 5.2 FTEs (Two Support And 3.2 Testing)

Ref. Metric Calculation Initial Year 1 Year 2 Year 3

C1 # of support FTEs that would be required 3.5 3.5 3.5

C2 Actual # of FTEs required =G1 1.5 1.5 1.5

C3 Annual fully burdened cost $120,000 $120,000 $120,000

C4 Total reduced support costs (C1-C2)*C3 $240,000 $240,000 $240,000

C5 Number of workdays saved per application test 10 10 10

20 apps * 4
C6 # of mission-critical app annual tests 80 80 80
quarters
$120,000/250
C7 Fully burdened daily cost $480 $480 $480
days

C8 Total avoided testing costs C5*C6*C7 $384,000 $384,000 $384,000

Ct Reduced ongoing support and application testing C4+C8 $624,000 $624,000 $624,000

Risk adjustment  6%
Reduced application development effort (risk- $586,560 $586,560 $586,560
Ctr
adjusted)
Source: Forrester Research, Inc.
 16

Increased Business User Productivity

So far, we have discussed technology savings associated with IE11. The benefits associated with increased
business user productivity, better alignment internally as well as with customers and partners, and greater
process efficiency are worth much more than the technology benefits. The interviewed companies talked about
many of these business benefits. Forrester only included one example in this study so as to not overwhelm the
results. A sampling of things the interviewees said include:

› “We are rolling out a new intranet to get our various business units better aligned. This will have huge benefits
and help us with competitive pressures. Improved performance with IE11 will increase user adoption and
deliver additional benefits.”

› “We have many customer-facing applications. Rolling out IE11 internally will give employees the same view as
customers which will improve interactions.”

› “Faster web application performance has made employees more productive. Our application performance is
now approximately 10% better.”

› “Most employees spend some time every day in our intranet, maybe as much as 10% of the day. Some groups
spend 100% of their day in these web applications. Increased application performance makes their work
easier.”

› “We will have better user productivity because they won’t click on things that don’t work. It will be a massive
savings for us. We have [over 100,000] employees who spend a couple of hours a day in these systems.
When things don’t work, some of them file help tickets and others try a second browser.”

› “Fourteen thousand employees no longer have to go through an emulator to get to the timesheet app. Each of
them saves 5 minutes per week.”
For the composite organization, Forrester included an example in which 5% of employees previously had to work
in multiple browsers because some external applications they needed required a more modern browser than IE8.
On average, they spent 6 minutes per day navigating between browsers and losing productivity because of the
break in workflow. This lost time was eliminated because all apps could now be run in a single browser — IE11.
Because not all productivity gains translate into additional value-add work, Forrester discounted this benefit by
50%. This benefit is consistent with the findings in a Thought Leadership Paper by Forrester Consulting
commissioned by Microsoft showing that IT organizations are embracing “desktop modernization efforts to boost
worker productivity, flexibility, and experiences.”2
Additionally, Forrester risk-adjusted this benefit by 13% because the level of productivity gained will vary based
on the number of users and the actual use cases. The risk-adjusted total benefit was $7,136,719 over three
years.
 17

TABLE 4
Viewing All Applications In One Browser Reduces Business User Downtime

Ref. Metric Calculation Initial Year 1 Year 2 Year 3

# of employees using multiple 125,000
D1 6,250 6,250 6,250
browsers employees * 5%
Average hours per day of lost
D2 0.10 0.10 0.10
productivity
$70,000 / 2,000
D3 Daily hourly fully burdened cost $35.00 $35.00 $35.00
hours
Total lost productivity from switching D1*D2*D3*250
D4 $5,468,750 $5,468,750 $5,468,750
between browsers days

D5 % of benefit realized 50% 50% 50%

Dt Increased business user productivity D4*D5 $2,734,375 $2,734,375 $2,734,375

Risk adjustment  13%

Increased business user productivity $2,378,906 $2,378,906 $2,378,906
Dtr
(risk-adjusted)
Source: Forrester Research, Inc.

Total Benefits
Table 5 shows the total of all quantified benefits across the four areas listed above, as well as present values (PVs)
discounted at 10%. Over three years, the composite organization expects risk-adjusted total benefits to be a PV of nearly
$8.4 million.

TABLE 5
Total Benefits (Risk-Adjusted)

Present
Ref. Benefit Initial Year 1 Year 2 Year 3 Total Value
Reduced implementation
Atr $498,200 $0 $0 $0 $498,200 $498,200
effort
Reduced application
Btr $507,600 $0 $0 $0 $507,600 $507,600
development effort
Reduced ongoing support
Ctr $0 $586,560 $586,560 $586,560 $1,759,680 $1,458,688
and application testing
Increased business user
Dtr $0 $2,378,906 $2,378,906 $2,378,906 $7,136,719 $5,915,988
productivity

Total benefits $1,005,800 $2,965,466 $2,965,466 $2,965,466 $9,902,199 $8,380,476

Source: Forrester Research, Inc.

 18

COSTS
The composite organization experienced a number of costs associated with the IE11 upgrade, all of which were offset by
corresponding benefits discussed previously:

› Internal implementation.

› Application development.

› Ongoing support.

Internal Implmentation
The interviewed companies were all very large, and therefore had fairly large migration efforts. This effort,
however, was much less than would have been expected based on previous IE upgrades as was discussed in
the Benefits section of this study. The implementation was broken into three phases — preliminary IT testing,
single location pilot and global web application testing, and global rollout.
In each phase, many different roles were involved. These included project management, application
development to do testing, system administrators, help desk administrators, business analysts, security
administrators, and communication/change management specialists. For the composite organization, the total
elapsed time was 12 months, and the implementation required 66 work months of effort.
The level of effort varied greatly based on the size of the organization and the number of applications that
needed to be tested. To compensate, this cost was risk-adjusted up by 8%. The risk-adjusted cost was
$712,800.

TABLE 6
Internal Implementation

Ref. Metric Calculation Initial Year 1 Year 2 Year 3

E1 Preliminary IT testing — # of months 2

E2 Preliminary IT testing — # of FTEs 3

E3 Pilot and app testing — # of months 5

E4 Pilot and app testing — # of FTEs 7

E5 Global rollout — # of months 5

E6 Global rollout — # of FTEs 5

E7 Total number of months of effort E1*E2+E3*E4+E5*E6 66

E8 Monthly fully burdened salary $120,000/12 months $10,000

Et Internal implementation E7*E8 $660,000

Risk adjustment  8%

Etr Internal implementation (risk-adjusted) $712,800

Source: Forrester Research, Inc.
 19

Application Devlopment
Of the 450 in-house web applications, the IT organization elected to redevelop 50 of them. This is significantly
less than the 200 that would have required development without Enterprise Mode, and the decision was made to
upgrade them because they were due for an update to meet new business requirements — such as adding new
functionality, increasing performance, or reducing risk associated with older technologies — even though there
were few issues with using Enterprise Mode for backward compatibility. On average, a web application required
60 hours of effort, although the time range between easy and hard coding was very large.
The number of web applications can vary widely depending on a company’s desire to rely on Enterprise Mode,
where their applications are in a natural life cycle, and how well they align to current business requirements. To
compensate, this cost was risk-adjusted up by 8%. The risk-adjusted cost was $194,400.

TABLE 7
Application Development

Ref. Metric Calculation Initial Year 1 Year 2 Year 3

F1 # of apps redeveloped 50

F2 Average # of hours effort =B2 60

F3 Application development hours F1*F2 3,000

F4 Cost per hour $120,000/2,000 hours $60

Ft Application development F3*F4 $180,000

Risk adjustment  8%

Ftr Application development (risk-adjusted) $194,400

Source: Forrester Research, Inc.

Ongoing Support
As with the previous two cost categories, there is a corresponding benefit or reduced effort that more than offsets
these costs. There is ongoing support for the new version of IE to deal with system update testing, cumulative
security patching, and any help desk queries. The level of effort is low and only requires 1.5 FTEs globally.
This cost can vary slightly based on the number of locations that need localized support and system testing. To
compensate, this cost was risk-adjusted up by 3%. The risk-adjusted three-year cost was $556,200.
 20

TABLE 8
Ongoing Support

Ref. Metric Calculation Initial Year 1 Year 2 Year 3

G1 # of FTEs 1.5 1.5 1.5

G2 Annual fully burdened cost $120,000 $120,000 $120,000

Gt Ongoing support G1*G2 $180,000 $180,000 $180,000

Risk adjustment  3%

Gtr Ongoing support (risk-adjusted) $185,400 $185,400 $185,400

Source: Forrester Research, Inc.

Total Costs
Table 9 shows the total of all costs as well as associated present values, discounted at 10%. Over three years, the
composite organization expects total costs to total a net present value of a little more than $1.4 million.

TABLE 9
Total Costs (Risk-Adjusted)

Ref. Cost Initial Year 1 Year 2 Year 3 Total Present Value

Etr Internal implementation $712,800 $0 $0 $0 $712,800 $712,800

Ftr Application development $194,400 $0 $0 $0 $194,400 $194,400

Gtr Ongoing support $0 $185,400 $185,400 $185,400 $556,200 $461,062

Total costs $907,200 $185,400 $185,400 $185,400 $1,463,400 $1,368,262

Source: Forrester Research, Inc.

FLEXIBILITY
Flexibility, as defined by TEI, represents an investment in additional capacity or capability that could be turned into business
benefit for some future additional investment. This provides an organization with the “right” or the ability to engage in future
initiatives but not the obligation to do so. There are multiple scenarios in which a customer might choose to implement IE11
and later realize additional uses and business opportunities.
The interviewed customers described how much faster the deployment was, as detailed in this study. They also said that
having made this investment will make the upgrade to Windows 8.1 or Windows 10 go faster and more smoothly with less
expense. IE11 also enables them to adapt more quickly to changing business and technology requirements, because all
modern browser standards are in place. One interviewee said, “IE11 makes us more agile because of Enterprise Mode.”
Another customer spoke of how using IE11 makes them more responsive to changing customer requirements. They said,
“Having IE11 has brought consistency to our environment. We can articulate to our customers how we operate, and we can
integrate them more quickly. This is especially so with our international customers.”
None of these flexibility benefits are included in the ROI analysis.
 21

RISKS
Forrester defines two types of risk associated with this analysis: “implementation risk” and “impact risk.” Implementation risk
is the risk that a proposed investment in IE11 may deviate from the original or expected requirements, resulting in higher
costs than anticipated. Impact risk refers to the risk that the business or technology needs of the organization may not be
met by the investment in IE11, resulting in lower overall total benefits. The greater the uncertainty, the wider the potential
range of outcomes for cost and benefit estimates.
Quantitatively capturing implementation risk and impact risk by directly adjusting the financial estimates results provides
more meaningful and accurate estimates and a more accurate projection of the ROI. In general, risks affect costs by raising
the original estimates, and they affect benefits by reducing the original estimates. The risk-adjusted numbers should be taken
as “realistic” expectations since they represent the expected values considering risk.
Table 10 shows the values used to adjust for risk and uncertainty in the cost and benefit estimates for the composite
organization. Readers are urged to apply their own risk ranges based on their own degree of confidence in the cost and
benefit estimates.

TABLE 10
Benefit And Cost Risk Adjustments

Benefits Adjustment
Reduced implementation effort  6%

Reduced application development effort 6%

Reduced ongoing support and application testing  6%

Increased business user productivity 13%

Costs Adjustment
Internal implementation  8%

Application development  8%

Ongoing support  3%
Source: Forrester Research, Inc.
 22

Financial Summary
The financial results calculated in the Benefits and Costs sections can be used to determine the ROI and NPV for the
composite organization’s investment in IE11.
Table 11 below shows the risk-adjusted ROI and NPV values. These values are determined by applying the risk-adjustment
values from Table 10 in the Risks section to the unadjusted results in each relevant cost and benefit section.

TABLE 11
Cash Flow (Risk-Adjusted)

Initial Year 1 Year 2 Year 3 Total Present Value

Costs ($907,200) ($185,400) ($185,400) ($185,400) ($1,463,400) ($1,368,262)

Benefits $1,005,800 $2,965,466 $2,965,466 $2,965,466 $9,902,199 $8,380,476

Net benefits $98,600 $2,780,066 $2,780,066 $2,780,066 $8,438,799 $7,012,213

ROI 512%
Source: Forrester Research, Inc.

FIGURE 5
Cash Flow Chart (Risk-Adjusted)

Source: Forrester Research, Inc.

 23

Microsoft Internet Explorer 11: Overview

The following information is provided by Microsoft. Forrester has not validated any claims and does not endorse Microsoft or
its offerings.
Microsoft offers innovative and transformational services for a mobile-first and cloud-first world, so you can do more and
achieve more; Internet Explorer is core to this vision. In today’s digital world, billions of people use Internet-connected
devices, powered by cloud-service-based applications, spanning both work and life experiences. Running a modern browser
is more important than ever for the fastest, most secure experience on the latest websites, connecting anytime, anywhere,
and on any device.
To help customers do more and achieve more, the latest version of Internet Explorer has increased performance, improved
security, better backward compatibility, and support for the modern web technologies that power today’s sites and services.
Enterprise Mode for Internet Explorer 11 offers better backward compatibility for sites designed for older versions of Internet
Explorer; IT pros can administratively force any site into any document mode, without changing a single line of code.
Features like Enterprise Mode can help customers upgrade and stay up-to-date with the latest software and updates.
Additionally, Windows 10 includes an improved version of Internet Explorer 11 that’s great for large organizations. It’s more
secure than ever and always up-to-date for modern sites, with Enterprise Mode compatibility for existing web apps.
Customers on Windows 7 can upgrade to Internet Explorer 11 now to more easily migrate to Windows 10.
 24

Appendix A: Composite Organization Description

For this TEI study, Forrester has created a composite organization to illustrate the quantifiable benefits and costs of
upgrading to IE11 from IE8. The composite company is intended to represent a multinational financial services company with
125,000 employees and is based on characteristics of the interviewed customers. The employees are located in 15 countries
across North America, Europe, and Asia, and they work across several divisions.
The vast majority of employees use Windows 7 machines, and IE8 is the corporate standard browser. Some individuals,
predominantly application developers, use alternative browsers if they need them for web app testing and other specific
activities. The company uses internally developed web apps, as well as web apps provided by third-party vendors. These
web apps are used by employees and provided to customers and partners. In total, there are about 450 web applications of
varying complexity and mission criticality.
In upgrading to IE11, the composite company has the following objectives:

› Provide a single browser that delivers all modern standards and capabilities.

› Reduce IT costs — operations and web app development.

› Adhere to an N-1 strategy for all technologies.

› Smooth the way for a future upgrade from Windows 7 to Windows 10.

› Reduce recoding for existing web applications.

› Continue receiving security updates and technical support after January 12, 2016.

› Improve IT security.
Because of these objectives, the migration from IE8 to IE11 was viewed as something that was required as opposed to a
“nice-to-have” system upgrade.
 25

Appendix B: Total Economic Impact™ Overview

Total Economic Impact is a methodology developed by Forrester Research that enhances a company’s technology decision-
making processes and assists vendors in communicating the value proposition of their products and services to clients. The
TEI methodology helps companies demonstrate, justify, and realize the tangible value of IT initiatives to both senior
management and other key business stakeholders. TEI assists technology vendors in winning, serving, and retaining
customers.
The TEI methodology consists of four components to evaluate investment value: benefits, costs, flexibility, and risks.

BENEFITS
Benefits represent the value delivered to the user organization — IT and/or business units — by the proposed product or
project. Often, product or project justification exercises focus just on IT cost and cost reduction, leaving little room to analyze
the effect of the technology on the entire organization. The TEI methodology and the resulting financial model place equal
weight on the measure of benefits and the measure of costs, allowing for a full examination of the effect of the technology on
the entire organization. Calculation of benefit estimates involves a clear dialogue with the user organization to understand
the specific value that is created. In addition, Forrester also requires that there be a clear line of accountability established
between the measurement and justification of benefit estimates after the project has been completed. This ensures that
benefit estimates tie back directly to the bottom line.

COSTS
Costs represent the investment necessary to capture the value, or benefits, of the proposed project. IT or the business units
may incur costs in the form of fully burdened labor, subcontractors, or materials. Costs consider all the investments and
expenses necessary to deliver the proposed value. In addition, the cost category within TEI captures any incremental costs
over the existing environment for ongoing costs associated with the solution. All costs must be tied to the benefits that are
created.

FLEXIBILITY
Within the TEI methodology, direct benefits represent one part of the investment value. While direct benefits can typically be
the primary way to justify a project, Forrester believes that organizations should be able to measure the strategic value of an
investment. Flexibility represents the value that can be obtained for some future additional investment building on top of the
initial investment already made. For instance, an investment in an enterprise-wide upgrade of an office productivity suite can
potentially increase standardization (to increase efficiency) and reduce licensing costs. However, an embedded collaboration
feature may translate to greater worker productivity if activated. The collaboration can only be used with additional
investment in training at some future point. However, having the ability to capture that benefit has a PV that can be
estimated. The flexibility component of TEI captures that value.

RISKS
Risks measure the uncertainty of benefit and cost estimates contained within the investment. Uncertainty is measured in two
ways: 1) the likelihood that the cost and benefit estimates will meet the original projections, and 2) the likelihood that the
estimates will be measured and tracked over time. TEI risk factors are based on a probability density function known as
“triangular distribution” to the values entered. At a minimum, three values are calculated to estimate the risk factor around
each cost and benefit.
 26

Appendix C: Forrester And The Age Of The Customer

Your technology-empowered customers now know more than you do about your products and services, pricing, and
reputation. Your competitors can copy or undermine the moves you take to compete. The only way to win, serve, and retain
customers is to become customer-obsessed.
A customer-obsessed enterprise focuses its strategy, energy, and budget on processes that enhance knowledge of and
engagement with customers and prioritizes these over maintaining traditional competitive barriers.

CMOs and CIOs must work together to create this companywide transformation.

Forrester has a four-part blueprint for strategy in the age of the customer, including the following imperatives to help
establish new competitive advantages:
Transform the customer experience to gain sustainable competitive advantage.

Accelerate your digital business with new technology strategies that fuel business growth.

Embrace the mobile mind shift by giving customers what they want, when they want it.

Turn big data into business insights through innovative analytics.

 27

Appendix D: Glossary
Discount rate: The interest rate used in cash flow analysis to take into account the time value of money. Companies set
their own discount rate based on their business and investment environment. Forrester assumes a yearly discount rate of
10% for this analysis. Organizations typically use discount rates between 8% and 16% based on their current environment.
Readers are urged to consult their respective organizations to determine the most appropriate discount rate to use in their
own environment.
Net present value (NPV): The present or current value of (discounted) future net cash flows given an interest rate (the
discount rate). A positive project NPV normally indicates that the investment should be made, unless other projects have
higher NPVs.
Present value (PV): The present or current value of (discounted) cost and benefit estimates given at an interest rate (the
discount rate). The PV of costs and benefits feed into the total NPV of cash flows.
Payback period: The breakeven point for an investment. This is the point in time at which net benefits (benefits minus costs)
equal initial investment or cost.
Return on investment (ROI): A measure of a project’s expected return in percentage terms. ROI is calculated by dividing
net benefits (benefits minus costs) by costs.

A NOTE ON CASH FLOW TABLES

The following is a note on the cash flow tables used in this study (see the example table below). The initial investment
column contains costs incurred at “time 0” or at the beginning of Year 1. Those costs are not discounted. All other cash flows
in years 1 through 3 are discounted using the discount rate (shown in the Framework Assumptions section) at the end of the
year. PV calculations are calculated for each total cost and benefit estimate. NPV calculations are not calculated until the
summary tables are the sum of the initial investment and the discounted cash flows in each year.
Sums and present value calculations of the Total Benefits, Total Costs, and Cash Flow tables may not exactly add up, as
some rounding may occur.

TABLE [EXAMPLE]
Example Table

Ref. Metric Calculation Year 1 Year 2 Year 3

Source: Forrester Research, Inc.

Appendix E: Endnotes

1
Forrester risk-adjusts the summary financial metrics to take into account the potential uncertainty of the cost and benefit
estimates. For more information, see the section on Risks.
2
“The Business Case for Standardizing on a Single Modern Browser in the Enterprise,” Forrester Consulting report prepared
for Microsoft Corporation, Microsoft website, December 2012 (http://www.microsoft.com/en-
us/download/details.aspx?id=36051).